


The Perfect End to The Perfect Day

by SoundandColor



Category: The Purge (Movies)
Genre: American Politics, Assassination Attempt(s), Banter, Boss/Employee Relationship, Disillusionment, F/M, Making Out, Panic Attacks, Post - Purge: Election Year
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-01
Updated: 2019-01-01
Packaged: 2019-09-16 15:20:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,981
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16956486
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SoundandColor/pseuds/SoundandColor
Summary: She outlawed The Purge with a stroke of her pen. Nothing's ever that easy.





	The Perfect End to The Perfect Day

**Author's Note:**

  * For [weasleytook](https://archiveofourown.org/users/weasleytook/gifts).



 

 

Charlie stares into her iPhone as she walks into the office of the Secret Service with quick and sure steps. When she enters the room, every man is at attention—her arrival having already been announced by the click of her heels on the tile and discreetly-placed cameras feeding into the bank of monitors. The lone exception remains seated, staring deeply into a laptop screen.

She hands the phone to her chief of staff, a tall reed-thin woman named Carmel, and clasps her hands.

“An above average amount of calls for my rape and dismemberment today?”

The men’s eyes dart away from her at the quip: They land just to the side of her or glance out the window, while someone in the back clears his throat. Leo is the only one who turns toward her. His face is in profile, but the corner of his mouth is tilted into a sharp downward angle. He stands quickly and when he fully faces her, he’s schooled his features into something blandly respectful.

“Madam President.”

“Special Agent Barnes.”

She knows he dislikes how lightly she speaks of the threats made against her life. It’s not that she doesn’t care, but when you get hundreds of them a day, thousands of them a week, they begin to lose some of their punch. If Charlie allowed herself to truly consider the magnitude of rage directed at her from certain corners of the nation, that entire groups lived all year for the one night they were encouraged to murder their fellow citizens… she’d climb into bed and never get out again. Fear spreads like wildfire, and there’s too much to accomplish to entertain any thought of it catching.

“The Purge.” Leo says without fanfare.

Charlie sighs. “Right. I have a speech planned for tonight, then the rest of the week I’ll be doing low-key charity functions. Carmel should have sent you our itinerary—”

“She has,” Leo says as Carmel’s head pops up, eyes sharp. “As your head of security, I need to say once more that it would be much safer if—”

“I am _not_ doing something pre-recorded and hiding in the bunker.”

Leo shakes his head with a sigh and says, mostly to himself, “I had to ask.”

“The Purge is done, I’m the one who got rid of it. I can’t look like I'm running scared on its first anniversary.” She hates using the word _anniversary_ to speak of the slaughter that occurred on March 22 for the last few years, but it’s been an extremely delicate tightrope she’s had to walk since signing the executive order getting rid of that terrible day.

“Of course,” Leo replies. “I just wanted to let you know that we’ll be upping security even more around the White House and on your person. It’s going to be intense for the rest of the month, then we’ll go back to the usual protocols if all goes well.”

“Thank you for keeping me informed and for all that you do.”

The men nod and begin moving back to their corners of the room. Charlie is turning to leave when Carmel clears her throat loudly and she spins back around on her heel.

“Special Agent Barnes?”

He stops and turns toward her. “Madam President?”

Charlie starts to speak, then steps closer to him positioning her back to the other agents, and lowering her voice. “I would like it if we could have a private meeting. Is 11 is good for you?”

“Sure.” The word sounds uncertain. Their private meetings are usually like this, in a room surrounded by her staff and his agents each morning. They’re rarely ever alone and she can see the surprise on his face. “I’ll be there, ma’am.”

Charlie smiles weakly and walks out, Carmel close on her heels.

 

…

 

Three hours later, Carmel shows Leo into the Oval Office and Charlie beckons him in, quickly shutting the door behind him. “Can you tie one of these?”

He narrows his eyes at the strip of silk hanging from her hand. “What is this?” Then he leans back and takes her in for the first time, confused. “What are you wearing?”

“The Founding Fathers have lunch at The Alibi Club every few weeks. They all wear linen suits and—”

“Bow ties,” Leo finishes for her warily, taking it from her hand.

“Someone who works a few blocks from the club let Carmel know the old windbags have started showing up. You know they won’t speak to me in the senate, they won’t take a private meeting.” Charlie puts on her coat and fixes her hair into a low bun. “They’ll talk to me today.”

She throws on a pageboy cap and turns for his inspection. “Well?”

Leo clears his throat. “They’re at The Alibi, right? That’s a men’s-only club and I don’t think you’re a gentlemen.”

“Of course not,” she says seriously, bending down and slipping into her oxfords before standing tall. “I’m a total cad.”

A small smile covers his face at that and ten years fall off of him in an instant. He looks _fond_ , for lack of a better word, and Charlie has to fend off a suddenly powerful urge to fidget under his gaze.

“Do you think they’ll actually let you in?”

“They can try to stop me.”

He looks concerned, so she moves closer. “Leo…” He blinks at her use of his given name and she realizes she hasn’t said it in a while. Not since she was sworn in and their duties began keeping them apart as often as they brought them together.

“Do you drive to work? Do you have a car?”

The new found warmth between them shifts back to a professional coolness at her question. “With all due respect, Madam President,” he says, stepping back. “These people did everything they could to kill you and now you want me to help you sneak into their secret clubhouse?”

“Not help,” Charlie corrects. “Just drive. I can’t have an entire security detail. They’ll be tipped off.”

“This isn’t a good idea.”

Charlie straightens her spine. “Then come to watch my back or get out of my way. Those are your only two options.”

He looks as though he could growl at her, but she stands firm and he relents.

“Meet me in the garage in 30. _Do not_ try to take the tunnels, that’ll call the agents attention. Just make sure you have somebody’s credentials on and walk out the door.”

“I’ll be there. And Leo, thank you—”

He’s out of the office before she can finish the sentence.

 

…

 

It’s easier to get off of the grounds than she assumed it would be. Charlie does exactly as he’d said: grabbed a set of expired credentials from her secretary’s desk and simply left. No one batted an eye.

He pulls up in a silver Altima and Charlie slips into the passenger seat. She looks around Leo’s car curiously. No old fast food wrappers or even dust on the dashboard. Fastidiously clean, which isn’t surprising to her for some reason. “Nice car.”

He makes a noncommittal sound. “It’s leased. I didn’t want to buy anything until I’d lived here for a little while.”

He pulls out and she watches in the side mirror as the White House first becomes a dot in the distance, then disappears all together. She licks her lips and takes a breath. Charlie fought hard and sacrificed everything to win the election, but she feels lighter now that the building is hidden from her view.

“Well?” He glances at her and she looks back at him, confused. “You have an opinion on it?”

“No,” she says, realizing he’s asking about the car. He waits and watches until she can’t stop herself from going on. “It’s just… I never imagined you driving a sedan.”

“What did you _imagine_ I would drive?”

Something about the way he stresses imagine catches in her mind. “I don’t know,” she finally says. “A truck? A muscle car?”

“I had one of those.”

“A muscle car?” He nods. “What happened to it.”

“Got shot up.”

She frowns. “Why is that not surprising?”

Leo shrugs casually and takes a sharp turn onto a car lined street. “So what’s your gameplan if they let you in? What’s your play?”

Charlie sighs and leans back in her seat. “Find some way to call a ceasefire until The Purge passes. I’ll have to give them something they want.”

“And what would that be?”

“Legitimacy.”

Leo shakes his head and grits his teeth. “This is a bad idea,” he says again and Charlie frowns with annoyance.

“You think I don’t know that? I’m trying to save as many lives as I can when this damn anniversary comes around so we have to make nice with the NFFA.” She crosses her arms over her chest. “No one forced you to come, anyway. All you have to do is sit in the car.”

“Oh, I’m not waiting in the car.”

Charlie narrows her eyes at him. “That was our agreement, Leo.”

“I never agreed to anything.”

“You know there’s nowhere to park down here. You’re going to get the biggest ticket of your life if you leave this car somewhere.”

“You think I give a shit about a ticket? You’re going to pay it.” His voice sounds agitated and his face hasn’t shifted from its usual glare, but his shoulders are loose and relaxed. She has the strangest feeling he’s laughing at her.

“I will not be paying the ticket,” she clarifies, and turns to face ahead. “You weren’t supposed to get out of the car in the first place.”

He scoffs, but stays quiet and Charlie, strangely enough,  finds herself enjoying the ride. “This is nice,” she blurts out. He glances at the side of her face, then looks back to the road.

“Just taking a ride, I mean. I can't remember the last time I had a conversation with someone where politics didn’t come up. It’s good just talking to someone.” She should stop. She knows she should stop talking right now but she’s never been good at that. “To _you_.”

She’s finally said the wrong thing. His previously relaxed demeanor immediately tenses up. The air between them is awkward—fraught with some tension they refuse to name.

She searches for something to say to bring back the easiness between them, but then leans forward instead. “We’re here.”

The Alibi Club isn’t much to look at from the outside. Just a squat, rundown looking row house not too far from Capitol Hill. Passers-by would never know that this is where the country’s political elite have come for years to do their dirty deeds.

“I thought the building was condemned not too long ago,” Leo says as they pull up to the curb along an obvious _No Parking_ sign.

“It was,” Charlie says and gets out before Leo can come around and open her door.

She’s halfway to the building before he catches up and she knocks heavily. There’s quiet for a length of time and just when she’s about to knock again, the door opens a crack.

“Madam President.”

She can’t make out his face, the man is only a shadow, hidden in the darkness between the front door and what looks like another door a few feet behind him. That one is still shit tight.

Charlie steps closer and feels Leo move along with her. “I have something I’d like to say to the men gathered here today.”

The man says nothing, then the door behind him opens widely and he steps even further back into shadow, extending his arm and inviting them inside.

Leo watches the man as they walk inside and he shuts the door to the street behind them, leaving only the dim light from the second door to guide them even further into the house. She can feel him unclip and grasp the butt of his gun, he’s so close on her back.

They walk through the entrance into a cramped hallway with a stairwell on one side and a wall on the other. Everything is wood paneled, run down and covered with old black and white photos and oversized furniture they have to turn sideways to slip past.

The man who let them in is nowhere to be found. There’s either another way out of the entrance, or he’s hiding against a wall until they’re out of sight. Charlie feels a burst of strangled laughter bubbling up inside of her at the thought of it.

With no other guidance, they follow the light flickering light against the walls at the end of the hall. Leo pulls her behind him as they go forward.

When they reach the back wall, a dining room opens off to their left. Although only four people are seated at the table, it’s decked out for a feast. Three men and one woman are seated at the table: two of them are newly appointed higher ups in the NFFA, Senator Shelby and Congressman Leonard. Charlie feels the woman watching her with a keen eye. Senator Combs. She was there that night in the church, up on the stage with Caleb and his brood of murderers.

Minister Owens is seated at her right hand, hunched forward in his chair slightly and smiling blankly at Charlie. She isn’t the only person with scars from that night—Owens has never been the same since, though he still receives a warm welcome from the NFFA.

“Would you like something to eat? Drink?” Combs asks conversationally. Senator Shelby holds up a glass of wine with a broad grin and Charlie fights back a frown.

“No, thank you.”

“Then what can we do for you, Madam President?” Combs asks, something sly in her voice.

“I would like us to put up a united front tonight. It would make a strong statement if you all came out and supported me during my speech.”

“Why would we do that? The people who voted for us never wanted The Purge outlawed in the first place. If they want to protest, it’s their right as American citizens.”

“Protest?” She asks, voice curt. “You mean murder?”

“Tomato. _Tomahto_ ,” Congressman Leonard states and Shelby laughs into his glass of wine.

“Then do it because you want to rebrand yourself. After what you tried and failed to do last Purge, after losing the election, you need to soften your line. You want to be seen as a kinder, gentler NFFA. Imagine how well it’ll be received if I were to speak on your behalf. Blame it all on Caleb’s bad leadership, a rogue faction of the party instead of a plot. Think of the optics of all of us standing together holding hands. It would look better for you than for me.”

“How would that benefit you?”

“It would save lives.”

Leonard scoffs loudly at that.

She stares at the man angrily before shaking her head. “Think about my offer,” Charlie says and is about to leave when Owens stands. They stare at one another for a long moment. They haven’t been in the same room since last year, but she feels fear clench inside of her at the look on his face.

“Is there something you want?” There’s obvious anger in her voice, but she can’t bring herself to regret it—not even at the other politicians idiotic glances and excited grins.

“I’ll pray for you,” Minister Owens says gently. He walks forward, starts to reach for her but Leo moves in, grabs his arm tightly and steps into his space. His voice is like iron. “No.”

“Please, gentlemen,” Combs says with a smile. “We’re only having a friendly lunch here. Let’s be civil.” She looks at Charlie curiously. “We’ll consider it. That’s all I can promise you. Show them out, Philip.”

The man who let them in appears through a hidden door in the dining room and shows them out of the front door.

There’s a ticket on the car.

She reaches for it, but Leo grabs it first and shoves it into his back pocket. He opens the passenger door and waves her in. Neither speaks until The Alibi Club disappears from the rearview mirror.

“That went about as well as I thought it would.”

Charlie shakes her head with a sigh. “Just drive.”

 

...

 

Later that evening, the drive to The U.S. Capitol Building is chaotic and it doesn’t slow down once they’re inside.

Charlie slumps down into the first chair she comes across and starts going over her speech for the sixth time in as many hours. The atmosphere around her is humming with activity. Interns and pages running messages, senators and congressman jockeying for the best positions to be seen in. She raises her head and catches Leo’s eye as he speaks quietly into his headpiece. He nods and she smiles slightly before taking a breath.

No prominent members of the NFFA signed on in support of her ending The Purge or showed up tonight. She’ll deal with it. Visiting the club was her hail mary pass and it failed. She’ll live.

“You’re on in ten, Madam President,” a young man says before running to the other side of the room and moving a few  of the lights. Leo comes over and helps her out of her seat. “You ready?”

She takes a deep breath, nods and they walk out onto the center aisle of the house chamber.

There’s movement in the corner of her eye, but Charlie keeps walking with a somber but appropriate smile, her mind focused on the podium ahead of her. She feels Leo place his hand at her lower back gently, guiding her to keep moving when she stops to speak with a senator. Charlie starts to take another step when he roughly grabs the fabric of her jacket and pulls her back into his chest.

“What are you—?”

She’s not given the chance to finish. Charlie gasps as she’s thrown across the aisle, hitting a row of chairs. Suddenly, people are screaming and running; their faces blurred, mouths open wide in panic. Something whizzes near her cheek and there’s a burst of heat across the lower half of her jaw. Charlie brings her hand up to her face numbly, and when she pulls it away, it’s slick with blood.

Leo’s screaming into his headpiece as he grabs her arm and starts dragging her away, but she doesn’t take much notice of him—she can’t stop staring at him. Minister Owens. There have to be eight secret service agents holding him back, but he keeps slowly making his way forward, toward her. His eyes wild with a crazed happiness.

“Once I spill your blood,” he screams, but it still somehow sounds like a whisper, like he’s speaking directly into her ear. “You will be cleansed in the eyes of the Lord and the country will be redeemed once more. The golden calf must be destroyed! We must die before we can be born again. Now come and repent your sins, Senator. Do your penance. Where are you going? Don’t run, you bitch! You whore!”

Leo pulls her out of the room and shoves her into the first office they come across with a lock. She crouches against the back wall, clutching her face. Her heart is pounding so hard she wants to scream. She can’t breathe.

“You’re panicking,” Leo says, searching for something in one of the desk drawers near her. His hands are bleeding a little, though she doesn’t know why. He pulls out an empty case of cartridges and curses loudly before moving away. “Put your head between your knees.”

“Do you think there’s more of them?”

“Anyone who comes through that door,” Leo says through clenched teeth as he drags a chair over and places it beneath the knob, “is their getting their fucking head blown off.

It shouldn’t, but the thought of that soothes her, and, just this once, she won’t allow herself to question it. She follows his advice and puts her head between her knees instead. Focuses on taking slow, deep breathes.

“I knew they would pull something sooner or later. I knew they would come after me.” Her voice is muffled and she isn’t sure he can understand a word she’s saying. She’s not even sure that she’s speaking to him _at all_ . Charlie just needs to get this out. “I never thought they’d do it tonight. I always think, _they wouldn’t,_ but they would. They do!” She’s getting hysterical. She can feel the fear and the anger and the shame and confusion welling up inside of her. To her horror, tears are leaking from the corners of her eyes. She raises her face and meets his gaze. “When are people going to stop trying to kill me?”

“ _Charlie_ …” He says lowly and kneels down next to her, leans in close and if they weren’t who they are, if they were anywhere else, she might think he was about to—

Then his headset bursts to life and as quickly as it started, apparently, it’s over.

Owens is dead.

 

...

 

She watches from a heavily secured Oval Office as The NFFA disavows all knowledge of Minister Owens’ plan.

“Liars,” Leo mutters and quietly closes the door behind him. Leaving them alone in the dim light from the television.

“Did you think they would admit it?”, she asks. He says nothing as Charlie changes the channel to the pre-recorded speech she would have preferred to give live. On the screen, her eyes look tired, there’s a few droplets of blood on the collar of her shirt and the bandage on her chin is bulky. She looks like she’s been put through the wringer and lived to tell the tale.

Afterward _,_ She’d finally sat down and allowed the plastic surgeon her handlers brought in to stitch her face up, though she’d steadfastly refused to go to the hospital. _This will make you a Trending Topic for sure. It just might get you some goodwill in the flyover states, too!_ Carmel had exclaimed, typing frantically on her laptop. Carmel was one of the very few people Charlie considered a friend here, but she’d had a hard time not dressing the woman down in that moment.

She hates that her second assassination attempt will become just another event to rustle up _goodwill_ and that Carmel will use her spilled blood for higher approval ratings. She also knows that if she were to tell her this, Carmel would simply say: _That’s politics._

Coming back to the present and deciding to turn the TV off altogether, Charlie drops them into near darkness. She gets up and moves to the side of the window. When she peeks through the drapes, the crowds gathered outside the gate look thick enough to drown in.

“There are literally people out there with torches.” Though nothing much shocks her anymore, she honestly doesn’t know what to make of it. “I should have given the speech anyway,” she says finally. “They got exactly what they wanted. Chaos. They won.”

“No, _you_ did. The Purge is gone and you didn’t die tonight.”

She laughs humorlessly. “My superpower is not dying no matter how many people try to assassinate me.”

“That would be a good one to have,” Leo says offhandedly. The chants of, “ _Purge_ , _Purge_ , _Purge_ ,” growing louder in the distance. He crosses the room and steps up behind her. He touches her elbow, guiding her further away from the window, then keeps his hand where it is. His thumb rubbing gentle circles in the bend of her arm.

She doesn’t stop to think. Charlie leans back into his chest tentatively and soaks in his body heat in the quiet and the dark.Then she decides she wants to do more. She turns around in his arms and he he doesn't pull away, she kisses him. Almost as surprising, he only hesitates a moment before kissing her back. It’s not that she’s never wanted to or never felt an attraction between them. She just assumed they’d keep ignoring it—this _thing_ —until some hazy moment in an unlikely future.

She’s not going to wait anymore.

Charlie steps forward and walks him back until he hits the edge of her desk. She leans in and kisses him gently at first. Letting it linger for long moments, letting herself sink in and enjoy this, enjoy _him_. When she nips his bottom lip, his mouth opens and she moves closer, slips her tongue inside. She drags her hands along his waist, under his jacket and runs them up the front of his shirt, around his middle and down to the waistband of his slacks. She pulls the shirt free of his belt, works her hand inside to finally touch his lower back, skin on skin, and Leo groans, a deep rough sound in the rear of his throat. He bends and cups her knee as he swiftly turns them both and lifts her onto the desk’s top. Charlie gasps, shifting her hold and taking fistfuls of his white button up, pulling him closer on a moan.

She can’t remember the last time she had sex.

The thought pops unbidden into her mind even though she has no plans on going that far tonight. There was Ryan, who she met the summer between her Junior and Senior year of high school. David, who she dated throughout college and thought she would marry someday. A one-off after she won her first council seat… All of that happened years ago. Leo brings his hand to her thigh, then slides it higher up over her hip. He stretches his thumb outward to follow the curve on the button of her pants, then drags it down along the teeth of her zipper. He never uses any pressure and stops long before it leads him anywhere too interesting.

 _She’s shaking_.

When she wraps her leg around his hip and uses her heel to press him even more perfectly between her thighs… The way she’s clutching for him would embarrass her if he wasn’t reaching back with the same urgency. He cups her face gently and changes the angle, kissing her deeper. Since he reacted so well to it earlier, she nips his bottom lip again—sharper this time—and Leo's hips seem to jerk against her instinctively. The motion sends a shock wave of electricity through her. She grips him tighter with her thighs, rolls against him intentionally this time— _slowly—_ and Leo first sags into her embrace with a groan, before going rigid and pulling away. They're both breathing hard even though they haven’t done much of anything at all.

“I met my ex when I was 17,” he says suddenly, dragging his hand through his hair. He didn't look this disheveled when an entire group of mercenaries were on their tail. “It was always her for me. When that ended—” 

He stops abruptly. Being the head of her security, he must know she’s read his file and she fills in the blanks on her own. He put himself on ice and focused his energies on finding the man who killed his son, on protecting the woman who would outlaw the terrible day he almost did something he couldn’t come back from. Leo swallows and looks at Charlie, something pleading in his gaze. “I don’t know how to do this.”

She wants to tell him it's okay, but she can't. Not until she knows one thing for certain and even though she doesn't want to ask, Charlie refuses to back down from her next question. “Are you still in love—”

“No.” His voice doesn’t shake and he doesn’t look away from her when he denies it. “That’s over and done with.”

The last thing she wants is to jump into something with a person who isn’t free to give her what she’s finally ready to ask for. Though Leo has never lied to her, she takes a long moment to consider him. She thinks about his drive, his baggage, this man who’s saved her life more times than she can count. He doesn't try to rush her decision or seduce her into taking him on. He simply waits her out. Something in her demeanor must soften—must show her acceptance—because he sidles closer and touches the back of her hand.

“Does telling a girl she’s pretty still mean you’re going together?”

The words send an embarrassed, yet sweet, thrill through her, but he’s frowning as he says them.

“I don’t know much about that myself,” she answers lowly. Turning her palm into his and threading their fingers together. “I’d like to try anyway.”

He nods and rests his forehead against hers. “I would too,” he agrees and pulls her closer.

He rubs his palm against her lower back and she let's him lull her into a contented silence for awhile, but there's something else she needs to know. “Tell me the truth.”

Leo looks down at her, eyes gone guarded, but he doesn’t try to avoid her. “What do you want to know?”

She takes a breath and stills herself. “Just how big was that ticket you got outside of the Alibi Club?” Charlie can barely hold her smirk in at the blank look on his face.

There’s absolutely no response for a moment, then he laughs. “Enormous.” He says through a smile and pushes his hips into hers, playfully. “Second biggest thing I’ve ever seen.”

She scrunches her face up at the crude implication. She brings his hand to her lips and kisses his bruised knuckles. She wants him to touch her again, but she puts those feelings away for now. “Who is this man in front of me?” Charlie asks, only half kidding. This time, when she leans in to kiss him, Leo meets her halfway.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for all your help betaing this fic, hellabaloo!


End file.
